Those numbers are pretty incredible. Remember how proud the astroturf group set up by the movie studios was that it got 100,000 "letters" to Congress in support of these bills? That took months, and the vast majority weren't letters, but signatures on an open petition -- and, as we noted at the time, lots of people seemed to want to take back their signature after finding out the details of the bill. However, in this case over one million emails were sent (and unlike Creative America, users were able to edit the emails to add their own thoughts) in just one day.

The Tumblr involvement is really amazing too. The company decided to hack together their phone call system in just a day or two, and then were able to deliver such a massive phone campaign to Congress. 87,834 actual phone calls in the course of a day, reaching 3.6 per second at some points. 1,293 hours spent talking. And Tumblr users alerted others as well:

This was an issue that much of the internet didn't know about before last Wednesday. And now huge populations online are aware of the bill and its consequences. And, they are willing to speak up to Congress about it.

Supporters of SOPA/PIPA like to claim that the public is behind them. Actual data suggests otherwise, but it got me wondering why people were so much more willing to speak out on this issue -- on a topic that rarely gets this kind of vocal grassroots support. Sure, people like the internet sites they use -- Tumblr, Reddit, FourSquare, Kickstater, and various other sites that spoke out against the bill. But, people also like music and movies from the big entertainment industry players. So why are they not buying the message from old Hollywood that they need SOPA/PIPA?

Part of it, I think, has to do with simple reality. People can look at the details of these bills and recognize why they're so bad, and go way beyond their stated purpose. But a larger issue, it seems, is the changing way in which companies interact with people these days. The big Hollywood studios and major record labels have spent the past decade treating their fans as if they were criminals. The assumption, at every turn, was that these people had the worst of intentions and only wanted to rip them off (despite plenty of evidence to the contrary). Thus, they focused on making life worse for users, with lots of collateral damage. Things like DRM and suing kids.

On the flip side, internet companies recognize that their users are everything. They build communities, they connect and they give those community members a voice -- rather than just assuming the relationship is one way (and only exists after you give them money). This is what Brad Burnham meant recently when talking about the "trust" that built the internet.

In some ways, it's just the other side of the coin of our discussions on the difference between gatekeepers and enablers. People tolerate gatekeepers grudgingly, because they're necessary, but often cruel. However they love enablers, because they allow them to do things that simply weren't possible otherwise... and let them retain control in doing so. That's much more powerful than people realize -- and it doesn't seem that the old line entertainment industry or many elected officials recognize that yet.

In fact, many in both of those camps are betting (heavily) that last week's outpouring of public opposition was a fluke, and not sustainable. I would take the other side on this bet. Last week's awakening of the internet was done on the fly with very little advanced planning and still turned out massive numbers. Beyond Tumblr setting up its phone system in about a day, much of the entire American Censorship Day effort was produced in just a little over a week by what's basically a brand new organization almost no one has heard of, Fight for the Future. Imagine what they, and others, can do with more time to plan and build on this initial success.

There's no doubt that the backers of this bill are outspending the opposition on lobbying by about 10x. And, as we know, money tends to speak in DC. But... all the campaign contributions in the world won't get you re-elected if the public won't vote for you. And the uprising here threatens to make SOPA/PIPA into an election issue, and the results above suggest that those who underestimate the public's dislike of any plan to censor the internet, even for the sake of copyright, may do so at their own peril.

Reader Comments

Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

THere are plenty of people in favor of SOPA and Protect IP. There are even more in favor of doing something, anything, about the piracy you feel should only be punished by, at worst, 3 demerits. But you dismiss them all as Big Media or Creators Who Don't Get It.

Alas, the other side of this bill is just as self-interested. Why do you think that Big Search is going bonkers and making up baloney about breaking the Internet? Big Search blacklists people and sites all of the time, but often it's just for competing with Big Search.

It's wrong to think of the astroturfers for Big Search as "the public". I don't think 99.9% of American knows about SOPA or Protect IP. They do think that censorship is bad in general, but then they also think theft is bad too.

So quit deluding yourself. You've got only yourself to blame. If you don't provide content creators the ability to protect their work and stop low-level "sharing", you're going to get draconian bills like this.

If you really want to stop SOPA and Protect IP, come up with your own bill with enough teeth to stop the free riding scum. And quit coming up with looney, extreme rationalizations to defend people who are, at the end of the day, just too darn cheap to pay $1 to buy a song.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Pretending that this isn't about free riding scum is just silly.

You're not fooling anyone.

I talked to my rep yesterday. We both agreed that what happened was a total "think of the children" move; that the issue was framed as a "the internet is about to be destroyed" situation, so of course people signed up. The manipulation that was going on was easy to spot by the Congresspeople and didn't fool them at all.

Thankfully that's why there are laws: to protect the pigs from each other.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

That or it helps demonstrate that he's full of sh*t. Watch:

Hey, AC (that would be you, the guy I'm replying to), guess what I did yesterday? I talked to BOTH my representatives. I discussed my concerns about SOPA/PIPA with them, explained my points of view, pointed them to a few studies and articles (from experts in various fields) and just in general discussed the issues. Both my representatives said they understood my point of view and to be honest had quite a few (and by a few I mean "many") phone calls from quite a bunch of other people stating essentially the same thing. They agreed with me entirely and said they'd be sure to do what was right.

Now, you have no proof that none of that happened. But you also don't have proof it didn't happen.

It's so easy to make sh*t up online.

I revert back to my opinion that most of these ACs who claim "the Wild West internet days are over and wre wre wre" are scared. They realize the public is against them, they realize people aren't wanting free stuff. People are against this because of how invasive it is on their rights, they're being told so by others who want to make them aware. Now they're speaking up. This scares the pro-SOPA/PIPA crowd. Thus they come to sites like this to b*tch and moan and try to play it like they aren't doing exactly that. The poor kids.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Yes, well i may be cheap, when all the wealth of the world is in the pocket of a total of 1%, then i think i reserve my rights. and anyway whatever mainstream media is creating/making us listen to is just crap, that i am not even willing to download, and more, there is absolutely nothing in it for the artists, it is all for the already-stinking-rich companies... you are a retard...

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

It all depends how you ask the question. They'll be against it if you say, "Should people be able to get their music/art/books without paying the person who worked long and hard to create it?"

But they'll be for something that's technically infringement if you ask them questions like, "Should you be fined $150,000 for reading a newspaper of a friend?"

The problem is that Big Search, Big Hardware and Big Piracy love to play in the gray area. Big Search can't make money on the pennies they get for ads if they have to pay the content creators so they cling to notions that it's all fair use. Big Hardware can't sell new hard disks and fatter MP3 players if the people have to pay $5000 for the 5000 songs to fill up the fatter flash drive. So they cling to the idea that DRM is somehow evil. Big Piracy can't make money period if they can't charge for "file storage" or "USENET access", wink wink.

The fact is that a huge percentage of people create content. They LOVE the idea that copyright protects the books they write or the music they play. They LOVE the idea that there's a chance that Big Content will like their creation enough to give them a big, fat content. If you told America that the price for embracing piracy was that they would get nothing more than a pat on the back for winning American Idol, 99.9% of America would choose the lotto ticket dreams.

The fact is the public has many reasons to LOVE copyright because copyright does many things to protect the public too. But loons around here just want to believe that charging someone $1 for a song is somehow screwing the public. Yeah.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

But they'll be for something that's technically infringement if you ask them questions like, "Should you be fined $150,000 for reading a newspaper of a friend?"

There's a reason for that: it's called "disproportionate retribution". If you can't see that there's a difference in trying to stop large-scale commercial piracy with fines/arrests/lawsuits and trying to stop someone from downloading the latest Lady Gaga song off of a torrent site so they can slap it on their iPod with fines/arrests/lawsuits, then I pity you.

The punishment should fit the crime, and many people don't see downloading music/movies/etc. from the Internet for their own personal use as a crime deserving of thousands of dollars in fines and years in jail.

they cling to the idea that DRM is somehow evil.

Yeah, DRM isn't evil. When a DRM server goes down and takes with it all the music/movies/etc. you spent thousands of dollars buying, that's not evil -- that's just another opportunity to buy all that content over again!

If you told America that the price for embracing piracy was that they would get nothing more than a pat on the back for winning American Idol, 99.9% of America would choose the lotto ticket dreams.

Yeah, and then they'd find out that their lottery winnings got taxed to hell and back by Big Media. (Remember: more major-label musicians make their bank via playing live shows than via CD sales.)

The fact is the public has many reasons to LOVE copyright because copyright does many things to protect the public too.

Yeah, it protects the public from that scary entity called "the public domain". That's why we have to keep pushing copyright terms out into infinity -- so that the public domain ceases to exist!

charging someone $1 for a song is somehow screwing the public

Lady Gaga once said she thought a dollar is too high for a single MP3 -- and she's a major-label musician. I think that says more about the economics of the music industry (not the record industry) than anything I could come up with.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

if we lose copyright then the mob just takes what it wants no matter what the artists want.

I hate to break the news to you, bob...but that's already happening right now. People ignore copyright on a regular basis. I'm sure you have, too -- how many times have you watched a movie clip or a music video on YouTube that wasn't an official upload?

The point Techdirt wants to make isn't that we have to make copyright protection stronger beyond any current standard in the world -- it's that we should be pushing for smarter, fairer copyright laws that benefit both the artist and the general public (which, if you did some research, is the original intent of copyright).

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

The point Techdirt wants to make isn't that we have to make copyright protection stronger beyond any current standard in the world -- it's that we should be pushing for smarter, fairer copyright laws that benefit both the artist and the general public (which, if you did some research, is the original intent of copyright).

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"But they'll be for something that's technically infringement if you ask them questions like, "Should you be fined $150,000 for reading a newspaper of a friend?"

LOL seriously Bob? In what universe? No one I know of thinks that's reasonable.

The problem is that your arguments are based solely on your opinions, throwing out numbers with no basis besides your own belief they are true... you can't be reasoned with when you confuse facts and fiction like you do.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Sigh. That's not what I said. I really have to write simpler sentences that don't require too much thought.

No, bob, your problem is that none of the sentences you have written here at all have required ANY thought, from you writing them or from us reading them.

How about you calm down, slow down, look around, and open your mind to the possibility that there are some things happening in the entertainment ecosystem you don't understand? There is a lot you could be learning right now - and you obviously care about this stuff, so you could actually be contributing. Instead you are carrying on a silly argument that makes you sound like you think it's 1992.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

bob, everything you write is so full of fail.

Big Search can't make money on the pennies they get for ads if they have to pay the content creators

Youtube is paying out millions of dollars to content companies. (http://www.youtube.com/t/press_statistics) And Vevo the joint venture between Universal, Sony, and Youtube has already been valued at over $300,000,000 and it hasn't even IPO'd yet (http://articles.businessinsider.com/2009-08-31/tech/30019043_1_vevo-music-videos-online-video).

Big Hardware can't sell new hard disks and fatter MP3 players if the people have to pay $5000 for the 5000 songs to fill up the fatter flash drive.

Western digital alone sold enough hard drives last year to hold more than all of recorded music throughout history. (http://forums.storagereview.com/index.php/topic/29488-2010-hard-drive-sales-stats/) And since people tend to store things besides mp3s I'm guessing they wouldn't be hurt to bad. Also, have you heard of this invention called video games, some of those are 20GB of data to install.

Big Piracy can't make money period if they can't charge for "file storage" or "USENET access", wink wink.

I'm sorry I thought the whole point of SOPA/PIPA was to stop other people from profiting off of your "work." So now they aren't making any money?

But loons around here just want to believe that charging someone $1 for a song is somehow screwing the public.

So, if just 10% of Americans (not counting the rest of the world)buy your song you make $30,000,000 for something that cost AT MOST $200,000 to make? That would be a profit margin of 99.3%, so yeah, I think people have a right to feel screwed.

Why don't you go out and read a few books, get an education, learn to understand what your talking about and then come back and try to share a coherent rant.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

That same public also have many reasons to despise it.
When a musician receive a negative from a place because they can't afford to hire him after being pressed by a collection agency I doubt that musician is in favor of artificial monopolies.

When people have to pay tens of thousands of dollars for old music to have them in their little projects I doubt many will be in favor of copyright monopolies that extend for life + 95 years, when a mother have her video pulled out from somewhere because somebody complained about the background music and called her a thief I doubt that person will be in favor of copyrights.

In reality copyrights only benefit a small part of the population for the rest is a tremendous pain in the butt.

If Ford was able to do without copyrights I believe others can too, if McDonald's and Coca-Cola were able to become mega multinationals without protections others can do too.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

They are people with lots of money, hence (according to the Supreme Court) also have more free speech than regular people. Who would have guessed that Nietzsche's dream would come true in a very legalistic way.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Wrong. There are plenty of little people like you and me. Yesterday, Mike lionized Mac Miller for SELLING 150,000 copies of his album. The reason the LITTLE guy was able to do this was because of copyright. It protects all of us equally.

Now, that still doesn't make the world a perfect place. Marketing is expensive. Distribution still costs money. The fact is that the LITTLE guy with talent still has one big cudgel in his hand when he/she sits down at the table with Big Content. That's copyright.

That's why I think the public actually loves much about copyright. Do they want to have their cake and eat it too by downloading free songs while selling their own? We're all human and we dream of this. But I'm sure that the public LOVES the idea of getting rich when the world recognizes the quality of their music/book/art/etc. I only wish the world could do this for more people.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Oh, I know. The world isn't fair and the rich still reign.

But copyright is what keeps the rich from simply taking the creations and not paying anything-- the way that Big Search tried to do with books and video. At least copyright forced Big Search to come to the table and offer $60 to the book authors. At the beginning, they wanted the book authors to just be happy to be listed on wonderful, magnificent Google. Pay no attention to what's going on behind that curtain, author types. Don't watch that big paycheck going to Big Search.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Bob,

I agree with you. I even agree that we need better laws protecting copyrights. I also agree that people are demanding a different medium. Case in Point the success of Spotify and Pandora. Let me ask you this - do honestly believe that Mac Miller would have sold 150k copies of his album and profited $10m?

I represent a Disney Radio NBT winner right now that toured with Bieber last year who is doing things differently and doing just fine. She also makes most of her money from radio royalties and live performance, and to date has given away all of her singles to her fans. People are looking for easier access and that's all. 200k plays on Spotify is pretty darn easy. 1000 plays on a FM network is not so easy, yet they pay the artist about the same. You tell me who is getting more targeted exposure? I'd argue for the Spotify artist that has 200k listens by true fans that will share that music on Facebook over and over and over.

Lastly, I have to remind you again - this isn't a piracy bill, it's about giving government the power to censor and the MPAA and RIAA the power to win lawsuits against companies with money so they can stop suing 12yr olds

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Did you even read the article? Mac Miller built up an audience by giving his songs away for free. Then his new found audience went out of their way to buy the album. This is not a good argument for you.

Then, there's the overwhelming fact that we're not talking about getting rid of copyright in it's entirety (There are a few here and there, but not Techdirt). We are talking about getting rid of a law that will punish far too many innocent people (and also not resolve the imaginary issue).

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Of course I read the article. He emulated the Big Media companies to the letter. He gave the songs away on the new version of the radio-- YouTube-- and then he pulled up a big, fat PayWall to make some money. More power to him. And why could he do that? Because he had copyright in his pocket ready to keep YouTube and the other infringing "innovators" from cutting him out of the profits.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Of course I read the article. He emulated the Big Media companies to the letter. He gave the songs away on the new version of the radio-- YouTube-- and then he pulled up a big, fat PayWall to make some money.

Asking people to pay, while still making sure the works are available for free is not a paywall. Except in your mind.

People are paying because they want to support Miller, because he connected with his fans. It has nothing to do with copyright.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

People may be choosing because he's connected with his fans, but they're paying money because there are MP3s from "Blue Slide Park" are not available for free. He's not giving away MP3s on MySpace and I don't see the new tracks among the mixtapes on his website. He's not giving people the right to make as many copies as they want. He's not following Cory Doctorow.

Face it. He's emulating the classic Big Media strategy and it's working well for him. He gave away the songs on the new radio-- YouTube-- and then charged people when they want to listen to them on their iPods. It's a very old business model.

Now I know you want to point to Spotify and YouTube. Spotify is a DRM-locked down, Paywall site. If you don't watch the ads or pay them cash, you don't get the music. You can't move your music to another platform unless you keep paying or you keep watching ads.The same goes for YouTube. If you don't watch the ads, you don't get the music. Neither of these sites are giving away MP3s.

This just proves we're converging. It's great to see that you seem to think that the new, royalty-paying options like YouTube and Spotify qualify for your pantheon. In the past, you kept pushing the idea that artists should just give away DRM-free MP3s on P2P networks and make money on concerts or t-shirts. You're coming around to reality. There's no way at that the old Mike would have embraced the locked-down Spotify/YouTube world.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Actually, YouTube is morphing in strange ways. Google's search engine still loves to point to torrent sites. They do it all the time. And YouTube is also quite happy to collect ad dollars when stuff is uploaded for free.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

So I don't know what to make of it all. But I do know that the "official" site pays royalties, but I would be willing to bet that the others don't.

Hahahah wow you have NO idea what is going on, do you?

This is the WHOLE point Bob: while you are "not knowing what to make of it all", an artist like this is just letting his stuff spread via whatever means people want to spread it, and giving them the option to buy should they so choose. And it's working.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

So I don't know what to make of it all. But I do know that the "official" site pays royalties, but I would be willing to bet that the others don't.

Well you just lost a bet then, because youtube uses the ContentID system so that if Miller has uploaded the content and has a partner relationship with youtube then he can monotize his music any time it appears on youtube.

See this is the problem. You have no idea "what to make of it all" nor do you have any understanding at all ... but hey, keep bitching about things you don't understand if it makes you feel better.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"Google's search engine still loves to point to torrent sites."

Well seeing as how the search engine is a mathematical algorithm unless you think math problems are sentient it probably just points to the most relevant results that people also choose the most often.

But really do you think people pirating is the majority of the internet? Lets say all infringement disappeared overnight, Google would still be the top search engine, #2 mobile OS, #2 browser, #1 map service, #1 ad-based email service, and the list goes on. I love how you imply that Google is afraid of infringement being eradicated like they still aren't making money hand over fist in dozens of projects. Also no one will ever bother to use search engines if they aren't looking for pirated content. Stop being so old, stupid, deceitful and willfully ignorant

Google is nothing but the messenger. It see's what people are searching for and displays it. It is long and short term trends. The content types see the results, and place all the blame on Google. To them Google is much like Joan of Arc.

Google is nothing but the messenger. It see's what people are searching for and displays it. It is long and short term trends. The content types see the results, and place all the blame on Google. To them Google is much like Joan of Arc. Their constant pushing Google to censor results, does nothing to stop infringement, it only hides it from the content types view.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

You do realize that it's possible to give away works without putting them under a Creative Commons license, right? An artist doesn't have to use a CC license to say, "Download my new song for free!"

the locked-down Spotify/YouTube world

Fun fact: show me a song on YouTube or list one you heard on Spotify, and it's likely that I could find it within five minutes either elsewhere on YouTube (hello, unofficial uploads), through a filesharing service like SoulSeek, or - believe it or not - an actual legal service like iTunes.

The Spotify/YouTube world isn't "locked down", or else we would only be going to Spotify or YouTube to listen to/buy music. The next time you want to use the term "locked down", think about what it really means.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

I know what locked down means. YouTube and Spotify have everything in common with DRM schemes:

* If YouTube/Spotify disappears, your ability to listen to the music disappears just like the worst DRM.
* If you want to move your music to another device, you've got to get permission from YouTube/Spotify. Heck, YouTube doesn't work on many devices without the right codecs.
* You've got to pay by either watching ads or giving away your privacy. I HATE the way that Spotify SPAMs me with the lists of what my friends are listening to. But that's the price.
* Neither YouTube or Spotify provide the music in open formats like MP3.

For most intents and purposes, YouTube and Spotify are DRM services.

So the next time you just offer a knee-jerk reaction, think about what you're being roped into believing in. YouTube and Spotify are very, very different from the P2P shangri-la that Mike once promised us.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

If YouTube/Spotify disappears, your ability to listen to the music disappears just like the worst DRM.

No, it doesn't. There are plenty of other outlets for music beyond YouTube and Spotify. Bandcamp, Soundcloud, Pandora, Grooveshark, Turntable.fm, and -- of course -- the "Big Pirate" route are all available to people.

If you want to move your music to another device, you've got to get permission from YouTube/Spotify.

You can't seriously believe this is true.

Heck, YouTube doesn't work on many devices without the right codecs.

That's a tech issue, not a copyright issue.

You've got to pay by either watching ads or giving away your privacy.

People will either block the ads, block the cookies that ruin privacy, block both, or go somewhere that doesn't force them to do it -- and, as I pointed out, there are plenty of alternatives beyond YouTube and Spotify.

Neither YouTube or Spotify provide the music in open formats like MP3.

That's because neither site is a music store/MP3 seller.

For most intents and purposes, YouTube and Spotify are DRM services.

No, they're not. You don't understand DRM at all. You don't understand how those sites work at all. I'm amazed that you even comprehend how the Internet works.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Sorry. But I do understand how the Internet works and I do understand DRM. Technology that forces you to pay or keep paying might as well be DRM even though you want to pretend it's just a "tech issue." It has the same effect and the music companies know it.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Bob, you SERIOUSLY need to learn a bit about how musicians distribute their work these days, especially in hip-hop.

There is a vibrant ecosystem of blogs that provide mixtape downloads, many technically "unauthorized" but fully embraced and promoted by the artists.

Try a new google search: blue slide park download. There are DOZENS of sources from such big mixtape blogs as dopehood and hiphopisdream. The "Big Content" strategy would be to send takedowns to all those blogs, thus FORCING people to buy from him on iTunes or MySpace. Instead, he provides those paid options for the fans who want to send some cash his way - but also is more than happy to let the ecosystem spread his music around for free.

Comparing his strategy to the old media strategy just further reveals how little you understand what is going on in music, tech and everything else these days (although your love of MySpace and your reference to AskJeeves have already revealed plenty)

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Yes, I'm sure that these unofficial channels exist and they seem to serve the same purpose as the radio used to serve. But don't be fooled. He's backed by Clear Channel and I don't see him pulling any Cory Doctorow moves now.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

This just proves we're converging. It's great to see that you seem to think that the new, royalty-paying options like YouTube and Spotify qualify for your pantheon. In the past, you kept pushing the idea that artists should just give away DRM-free MP3s on P2P networks and make money on concerts or t-shirts. You're coming around to reality. There's no way at that the old Mike would have embraced the locked-down Spotify/YouTube world.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Really? Spotify and YouTube are a long, long way from the P2P shangri-la you promised us. Spotify is one big paywall with options for those who want to SPAM their friends. YouTube is some mixture, but I see Mac Miller embracing the royalty-producing side just like any old-school record producer.

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Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"Now, that still doesn't make the world a perfect place. Marketing is expensive. Distribution still costs money. "

The Internet is more or less free marketing and distribution, especially once you use P2P. Oh wait, P2P is evil you say. Sorry! We'll somehow make technology stay at a standstill and make new inventions illegal!

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Well, yes. But I'm sure you see the pickle. While I wish that the world would allow us to just give away our MP3s on P2P networks and make enough money to get by, it rarely works out that way. That's why Mac Miller had to hoist the paywall.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

So if I can listen to ALL his music free on youtube and bandcamp how does he have a paywall? He has an option to listen to his music free and an option to buy, they are not mutually exclusive. A paywall mean it is hidden behind a wall and you have to pay to get over the wall. His sit is sitting out in the open for free, he just gives you an option to buy.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

No. You can't listen to "Blue Slide Park" on his site. Just various mixtapes.

Plus, YouTube won't work on your iPod. YouTube locks up their music in flash video files. They're not free MP3s like Mike has endorsed.

And really just how much is he giving away on YouTube? I only see an official version of "Blue Slide Park", the track. Not the whole album. The rest are unofficial pirated versions. There's very little "official" music that he's giving away, at least as far as I can tell.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Well, of course Youtube won't work on your iPod. The iPod doesn't allow for any media to be on it without it being load through some kind of media manager, like iTunes.

However, Youtube WILL WORK on your iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad. No problem at all.

I think you should just stop talking Bob. I've read all the comments on this article so far and you contradict yourself from one moment to the next, state things that are completely wrong, state things that are proven wrong within seconds (with evidence by others), etc.

Just stop. Quit. You're not doing anything even remotely positive for your point of view.

Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to go to my Big Bank, then buy some Big Hardware at my local Big Retail, stop on the way home by some Big Food to pick something up to eat. Then come home and sit on my futon (also purchased from Big Retail) while I do some work on my computer (Big Hardware purchased also from Big Retail). : )

Major technical ignorance fail on your part. YouTube provides a flash PLAYER for the videos. The video files aren't "flash", they use a standard codec. All smartphones provide software that can download the video directly WITHOUT FLASH. There are literally HUNDREDS of programs that bypass the Flash file and go straight to the Video file. Hell, even YouTube provides a 100% pure HTML5 frontend for the videos for those browsers that support it.

Seriously, at this point just do yourself a favor and remove yourself from the gene pool. Or at least try to Google things... oh right, I forgot, you're afraid of Big Search, so you're just going to say whatever comes to mind without even looking up anything.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

And what about your earlier comments about hard drives? From what you wrote, it seems you think that the ONLY use for a hard drive is to store infringing files. Which is wrong. Hard drives store a lot more than infringing files. To take your belief to its (il)logical extreme, would be to mandate in law the maximum capacity of hard drives, out of a fear of piracy. This would impact tons of industries, that store commercial/scientific/medical/etc data on hard drives, often in the hundreds/thousands/millions of gigabytes range.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Yesterday, Mike lionized Mac Miller for SELLING 150,000 copies of his album. The reason the LITTLE guy was able to do this was because of copyright.

It was? That's funny. I thought it was hard work, dedication, and a good business strategy. Now you're saying that copyright did all of that!

OK, sarcasm aside, I think I know what you're trying to say: copyright enabled that by protecting his work so it wouldn't get stolen.

Prove it. Seriously. If you're going to make assertions like that you need to come up with more than "it worked and copyright laws were in effect therefore it's copyright that let it work." How much did copyright protect him? How many sales would he have lost had copyright not prevented copying? How many people did he take to court over copyright violations?

If you're suggesting that copyright kept people from making unauthorized copies and only because of that was he permitted to succeed, then why doesn't it work for the RIAA? You're trying to claim on one hand that current copyright law is good enough to protect an independent musician with limited resources, and not only allow him to make a living but to excel, but it does not protect an industry with enormous resources from being totally shut down?

Is there an inconsistency somewhere in your argument?

I realize that to make my point I've put some words into your mouth, and so I am in grave danger of having made a strawman argument. If I've done that, I apologize, it was not my intention; rather I was trying to clarify what I thought you meant. Please, if that is not what what you intended to say, by all means tell me what words you meant.

Because it sure looks to me like you're saying that the present copyright laws are plenty strong enough, therefore they need to be stronger because they're not strong enough.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

So sorry. "Prove it" is the sound of you punting because you can't prove your point.

This site continues to post promises that artists will be able to make a living by giving away MP3s and monetizing the good will in some other way. Yet aside from a few outlying cases, we don't see this happen. It's a rarity. But if there were any truth to these claims, we would be seeing it more and more.

So Mac Miller comes along and I decide to see just why Mike is lauding him. What do I find? Miller has his work behind a big, fat PAYWALL. You can't find the MP3s from "Blue Slide Park" on his web site. Heck, you can't find the words "creative commons" on his website at all.

So it's up to you to prove. Start your own record label and publish a few albums while releasing them under a CC license. If you build a sustainable business, then you'll prove it to me.

I've got plenty of sustainable old-school Big Media companies that prove how well copyright works. Show me more than a few occasional success stories.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"Prove it" is the sound of you punting because you can't prove your point.

You're the person who's contradicting himself with every other post; you might want to think about showing some continuity before you tell others their arguments are bad.

This site continues to post promises that artists will be able to make a living by giving away MP3s and monetizing the good will in some other way. Yet aside from a few outlying cases, we don't see this happen.

Lots of artists fly under the radar of the press, be they a blog like Techdirt or a newspaper like Variety. That doesn't mean that there aren't artists who make a living by using "free" as part of a larger business model.

Not every artist is going to make a living off of their creative works; that's a fact of life. Business models don't guarantee success; if they did, there would be only one business model and everyone would be using it.

That's what makes the modern day so great: there is no one business model, so everyone has a chance to experiment and create a business model that's suited to their works and their personal lives. If someone wants to give away music for free and monetize their music by way of concerts or specially-printed CDs or any other method they want to try, what's the problem?

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

This site continues to post promises that artists will be able to make a living by giving away MP3s and monetizing the good will in some other way. Yet aside from a few outlying cases, we don't see this happen. It's a rarity. But if there were any truth to these claims, we would be seeing it more and more.

Just because YOU don't see it, doesn't mean it's not happening. We get multiple examples every day. We can't keep up. And if you look at the aggregate numbers, damn. Things are going great for the entertainment industry these days.

So Mac Miller comes along and I decide to see just why Mike is lauding him. What do I find? Miller has his work behind a big, fat PAYWALL. You can't find the MP3s from "Blue Slide Park" on his web site. Heck, you can't find the words "creative commons" on his website at all.

You keep using "paywall." I don't think you know what that word means.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

No, I do see it and I see people making a few pennies here and a few pennies there. I think giving away free samples is a perfectly good idea for every business. But I just don't see anyone making a living without setting up a paywall.

We've been challenging you for years to come up with more examples but all we hear is (1) Radiohead and (2) check out this guy who sold music boxes. If there were anything to this, we would see musicians quitting their day jobs. But they aren't.

And I know what paywall means. You can't get MP3 versions of "Blue Slide Park" from his web site. You've got to pay someone or listen to ads from a site that pays him royalties. And really, I have trouble finding official versions of all but one track on YouTube.

Is he really one of your disciples? I don't think he's a follower of Cory Doctorow. I think he's a follower of every big record producer that's ever come through the music business. He wants to make money from his talent and, alas, selling t-shirts and putting up a tip-jar aren't the way to make plenty of money.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

SHUT UP ABOUT "OFFICIAL" VERSIONS!

I mean seriously Bob, this is just getting pathetic.The reason there is no big fancy official free download page is because he KNOWS and LIKES the fact that his fans are distributing it free for him.

Try to understand this: HE WANTS HIS ALBUM TO BE PIRATED. It's great, it saves him the hassle of creating his own distribution platform, which seems to be what you demand. Why would he bother paying for his own bandwidth to offer downloads? Just to avoid frightening out-of-touch folks like you with scaaaaary unauthorized versions? It's much better to let his community of fans take care of it.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

I just don't see anyone making a living without setting up a paywall.

That sounds like a personal problem.

If there were anything to this, we would see musicians quitting their day jobs. But they aren't.

Gee, imagine that -- it's almost like the economy is in the toilet and every musician isn't a billionaire by default for the simple fact that they make music.

Some artists get lucky and hit the big label lottery. For every Lady Gaga, there are a thousand other artists who struggle to make ends meet -- and stricter copyright laws aren't going to change that reality.

No business model -- not even a paywall -- offers a one-hundred-percent return on investment. The group TLC sold millions of albums and still had to declare bankruptcy thanks to their record label's accounting tactics.

I have trouble finding official versions of all but one track on YouTube.

Here's a fun idea to consider: maybe Mac doesn't care that other people upload his music to YouTube.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

And I know what paywall means. You can't get MP3 versions of "Blue Slide Park" from his web site. You've got to pay someone or listen to ads from a site that pays him royalties. And really, I have trouble finding official versions of all but one track on YouTube.

Is he really one of your disciples? I don't think he's a follower of Cory Doctorow. I think he's a follower of every big record producer that's ever come through the music business. He wants to make money from his talent and, alas, selling t-shirts and putting up a tip-jar aren't the way to make plenty of money.

Again, we've never said that you should never charge for things. Why do you continue this myth?

What does Cory Doctorow have to do with anything?

And we've never, ever, said that selling t-shirts and tip jars was the answer?

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

You're a psychopath Masnick. You've been quoted on the tshirt angle,

Where? I've never said selling t-shirts was a bad idea. But I've *never* suggested that the business model is about just selling t-shirts.

and the rest of your MO is basically that musicians need to tour or beg for charity.

Um. I've actually said that begging for money is NOT a good business model.

Are you unable to read?

You're not fooling anyone. Why in God's name do you think you are? Go see a mental health professional.

It would appear that *someone* is fooling you, since you appear to believe I have said stuff I have not said. I would suggest that the person who has voices in his head (hint: that's you) would be the one more likely to be in need of psychiatric help.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Actually do some research bob and show more then wild conspiracy theories. I've been reading through this thread over a day now and I've noticed everytime someone calls you on something, you start using words like 'earmarks' and the like to try to bluff your way out of actually explaining what you mean.

Anyone with a basic understanding of business can tell you that supply and demand means making a demand for your product. With the music industry, really the key is to focus on making the consumer want more of your work, not just paying for that one song. Free downloads are essentially a form of advertisement, wether they're legal or not.

Most businessmen don't realize that, yet you see things like openOffice and other freeware softwares thriving when Microsoft should have broken them down in your theories.

RE: SmokedToast

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Wrong. There are plenty of little people like you and me. Yesterday, Mike lionized Mac Miller for SELLING 150,000 copies of his album. The reason the LITTLE guy was able to do this was because of copyright. It protects all of us equally.

Um, nothing about his sales involved copyright. Bob, do you not realize you can still sell stuff while ignoring the copyright issue. We sold a bunch of copies of my book, which is made up entirely of posts from this site, which are public domain.

Have you seen how many copies of the Bible and Shakespeare are sold each year, despite being public domain.

You are a very confused man. Selling stuff does not mean relying on copyright.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Unavailable? I'm sure that there are plenty of torrent sites ready to help. ANd you can always just upload it to Scribd. Come on. Don't worry about royalties. You'll make it up in t-shirt sales and good will.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Unavailable? I'm sure that there are plenty of torrent sites ready to help. ANd you can always just upload it to Scribd. Come on. Don't worry about royalties. You'll make it up in t-shirt sales and good will.

Indeed. We're happy to give it away for free. The real issue is that we don't have it in a reasonable format yet, because when it was originally produced, it was just for the printable version, since all of the content was already on the site. That's going to change shortly, and we'll have an ebook version available very soon.

But, yes, we'll make it up plenty on voluntary payments and t-shirts and other forms of support.. Glad you're finally recognizing how this works.

Just today alone we had another bunch of people *just give us money*. It seems that they do that even though we don't copyright our stuff. According to you, that's impossible. Funny that.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

I would torrent Mike's book...but I choose not to. He's connected with me (a fan) and that's Rtb (Reason to Buy). So, in a sense, I'm not paying for the book. I'm paying for the CwF. The book can now be viewed as a bonus, once I compensate Mike monetarily for the CwF.

I could name others, games that where not well known till they became stars on torrent and other download sites that went on to sell insanely well.

example of that would be "Sins of a Solar Empire" the game has no DRM, you could make up a fake key and reg an acct for updates and online play, yet people still bought it, infact many people bought it because it lacked any form of buggy drm.

you really should read stardocks view on piracy and how to deal with it and their gamers bill of rights...

just my opinion but copyright needs to be reverted to its original form and purpose rather then this perpetual extension crap that lets the mafiaa make money of stuff for decades/centuries after the artists died....

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

How do you know he didn't fight the Internet? Just because he didn't put out a press release and sue someone? That's bogus. If he really thought there was a value in free circulation of his MP3s, he would have them up on his site and any site he controls. But he's not doing that. Nope. He's just got up some mixtapes and other free samples.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

How do you know he didn't fight the Internet? Just because he didn't put out a press release and sue someone?

That, and there's no record of him using the DMCA to take down the "unauthorized" uploads of his music on YouTube or elsewhere.

He's just got up some mixtapes and other free samples.

So? Nobody ever said he had to give away his entire catalogue of music -- not even Mike. Even if he's not doing it himself, others are doing it for him -- and he seems perfectly fine with that. What's the problem?

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

If he really thought there was a value in free circulation of his MP3s, he would have them up on his site and any site he controls.

Why? Seriously - why bother? People are doing it for him and it's working just fine. There is an existing, free, automatic distribution system available to him - why do you insist he needs to build his own? Is that what you do with your time, bob? Waste it replicating things that other people are already doing for free?

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

No it doesn't, copyright is costly only the very rich can afford all the protections copyright offers the little guys don't have that luxury and they also suffer from bias, a little guy bringing a lawsuit against giants is probably doomed.

Besides you can't explain why restaurants can become big chains without no protections at all, or how there are multimillionaires in the fashion industry without protections.

Those protections are granted monopolies that do more harm to little people than they do good.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Actually, bob, the "little" guy doesn't get jack squat from the $ you spend on iTunes or in the store on CDs. Sure, they make a handful of cents per song sold, but the bulk of the money goes into the pockets of Big Hollywood. If I knew that the money I was paying for a song went to the people who made that song, you can bet I'd be purchasing those albums.

The fact is that "little" guys are actually embracing piracy. Markus "Notch" Persson, for example, developed a little game you might of heard of called "MineCraft". He's publicly stated that he hasn't lost a single dollar to piracy, though a quick search for "MineCraft Torrent" will let you know there's no lack of ways to obtain the game without paying for it.

Now I'm not saying that piracy is right, but your argument against it thus far is invalid.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Even better, bob must have learned math at a record label accounting school.

.1% of Americans is only 30,000 people. Does he really think that 87,000 phone calls, 1,000,000 emails, and 3,000 letters where all generated by less than 30,000 people? Sure, it's possible, but it's far more likely that bob is an idiot.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

The MPAA already tried to show that people support the bill with their own petition and they failed. After several months of trying they hardly got anyone to sign their petition and many who did sign were fooled into doing so and later requested that their signatures be retracted.

Why can't all these people in favor of this legislation start their own petitions and gather a lot of signatures? Why do they have to trick people into signing their alleged grassroots petitions and then they had to fudge the numbers to make it look like more people agree with their stance?

Face it, you're failing to gain public support. Hardly anyone signs your petitions and many who do are fooled into doing so.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Because Big Content isn't as adept as Big Search, Big Hardware and Big Piracy at astroturfing. As Mike might say, "They don't get the Internet."

But look at the so-called grassroots organizations that are in favor of this. TechDirt is sponsored by Google. There's a revolving door between the EFF and Big Search. The EFF also takes money from Big Hardware, AKA the CEA. CDT gets a huge block of its funding from Big Hardware and Big Search:

Maybe it all just depends what you read. If you go read Daily Variety or some of the Big Content publications like PaidContent, you'll see that there's plenty of support for doing something, anything to curb piracy.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Look at that, major Internet/technology companies have a vested interest in keeping the Internet free from overly-intrusive legislation that would turn a global communication network into just another Big Media outlet and stifle innovative new Internet technologies from starting up in the face of fines, lawsuits, and jailtime.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

What's evil? A global conspiracy by Big Search, Big Hardware and Big Piracy to strip creators of the right to control what happens to their work product. A conspiracy that believes that the only innovation is the innovation that cuts the creators out of the loop. A conspiracy that thinks that musicians, authors, and artists aren't worthy of being called "innovators" because that's a term that only programmers and VCs in Silicon Valley can use.

Oh I could go on. It's very evil if you're an artist and you're told that being cool means letting a bunch of Silicon Valley billionaires get even richer but you get nothing but a few pats on the back.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

A global conspiracy by Big Search, Big Hardware and Big Piracy to strip creators of the right to control what happens to their work product.

I'm pretty sure that copyright became obsolete long before Google became the biggest search engine on the planet, Apple released the iPod, and The Pirate Bay evolved into the largest torrent tracker on the Internet.

Copyright is obsolete specifically because it is impossible to completely control the spread of a creative work any more. The Internet exists, and there's no putting the genie back in the bottle. This lovely global communications network has made the sharing of content effortless and inexpensive; it's not my fault if Big Media hasn't figured out a way to capitalize upon that and deliver content to an audience eager for it without fucking things up.

A conspiracy that believes that the only innovation is the innovation that cuts the creators out of the loop.

Didn't copyright holders and content creators feel the same way about the phonograph, the radio, the television, the VCR, and the MP3 player?

A conspiracy that thinks that musicians, authors, and artists aren't worthy of being called "innovators" because that's a term that only programmers and VCs in Silicon Valley can use.

Show me evidence of this belief, please.

It's very evil if you're an artist and you're told that being cool means letting a bunch of Silicon Valley billionaires get even richer but you get nothing but a few pats on the back.

I wasn't aware that Google was getting richer because musicians are putting out music for free on their personal websites. I wasn't aware that Microsoft was getting richer because authors made their writing available for free on their personal websites. I wasn't aware that...aw, you get the point.

Your arguments are fallacious (at best) and intentionally misleading (at worst). Tech companies aren't out to destroy copyright; if anything, they're out to save it from being completely destroyed by Big Media's attempts to turn copyright into their own personal legal cudgel.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

OOOOOHHHH global conspiracy! Sounds thrilling, tell me more, Wait let me get some popcorn. Oh wait you don't think the Jews are involved do you, because I'm not even going to let you start if that's the case. But if its not Jews don't ruin it for me, I really hope its mole people.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"to strip creators of the right to control what happens to their work product."

They never (should never have) that right. Copy protection laws should be about promoting the progress and expanding the public domain, not about giving creators "the right to control what happens to their work product". If these laws are about anything besides serving a socially beneficial purpose (and you even seem to admit that they're being used for reasons other than serving the public good) then I say we abolish them. ABOLISH IP!!!!

If a creator (or an IP holder, since the people who want these laws the most aren't the creators, but the parasite middlemen) insists on having IP to create that creator can find another job.

"A conspiracy that believes that the only innovation is the innovation that cuts the creators out of the loop."

What loop? They don't need IP laws to be 'in the loop'. There are other ways they can make money.

"A conspiracy that thinks that musicians, authors, and artists aren't worthy of being called "innovators" because that's a term that only programmers and VCs in Silicon Valley can use. "

Those are only your words. The fallacy here is in assuming that they need IP privileges to be considered innovators.

"Oh I could go on."

Like others have said, I'm sure you can. The question is, can you say anything meaningful?

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"TechDirt is sponsored by Google."

Evidence.

"you'll see that there's plenty of support for doing something, anything to curb piracy."

No I won't. I'll see a pro-IP publication advocating more IP laws, I won't see that there is plenty of support by many people to 'curb piracy'. Just the publishers. Just because some publishers support something hardly means there is plenty of support for it.

Oh I see. You dismiss those who disagree with you as simply "Pro-IP publications", not people. But all of these astroturfing organizations for Big Search are honest, salt-of-the-earth. Go on and keep believing that only your side is made up of real people.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Well, you might start by looking at the ads. Google doesn't put its name on the AdSense ads any more, but they're one of his ad sales partners.

Adsense pays shit. The terms don't let us reveal our actual revenue, but I can say that the monthly revenue from AdSense is equal to about a day of our hosting costs. In terms of revenue, Adsense represents not even a rounding error.

Then there are the conferences that they pay him to run:

Google provided space and food. They didn't "pay me to run" the conference. I asked them if they could provide space and food and they did. I later proposed a second event and they said no.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Oh god! Stop the presses! There's an advert! For Intel!

Seriously, bob, you are the worst idiot I have ever had the displeasure to see on Techdirt. At least Ootb provides semi-coherent arguments. You literally just threw up that there is an ad, implying that that is somehow evil.

and I can go on. This isn't about 'big search' it's about having good laws. To the extent that 'big search' supports laws that I (and others) agree with, I'm all for it. and when Google does something wrong, or supports a pro-IP position, I and many others will be here with Mike to criticize them, because the last thing we need right now is more restrictive IP laws and more government established monopolies. This isn't about 'big search', it's about repealing bad laws.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

It's not astroturfing if the sponsors are made transparent. Your link makes the sponsors apparent. When the MPAA did it, at least initially, they tried to hide who was behind the campaign.

I don't mind that some of these endeavors are sponsored by Google. At least they're transparent about it. The point is that I, and others, will support positions that we agree with and oppose positions we don't. To the extent that Google supports positions that I (and others) support, they will gain public support. I and others don't support these positions just because Google supports them, we support the positions we support because we believe them to be socially beneficial. I do not believe copy protection lengths should last 95+ years. Many agree. That's not a position anyone holds just because Google may support it. We hold that position independently of Google. IP laws have gotten out of control and no one supports more IP laws because these laws are not socially beneficial. These laws are widely opposed not because Google may oppose them, they are widely opposed because they are bad laws. Nobody wants these laws and if Google wanted them I would oppose Google just as well. I have no problems with Google opposing more IP restrictions, I do have a problem with the MPAA et all promoting more IP restrictions. The people do not want these laws.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

But look at the so-called grassroots organizations that are in favor of this. TechDirt is sponsored by Google. There's a revolving door between the EFF and Big Search. The EFF also takes money from Big Hardware, AKA the CEA. CDT gets a huge block of its funding from Big Hardware and Big Search:

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

I'm sorry. It doesn't debunk it to me. It's a large enough percentage to explain why they're making the decisions that they do.

And you can't always go by percentages because the money is earmarked in many ways. For all we know, the big block of foundation money goes for "open government". But I'm guessing the money from Big Search and Big Hardware goes a long way to paying the salary of the guys down the hall who are staying up nights dreaming up ways to make SOPA sound very scary.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Big Piracy are the file lockers, the USENET hosts and everyone else who charges for access to a collection of data that is widely understood to be pirated material. Perhaps you lump ISOHunt with Big Search. Perhaps you lump them with Big Piracy. The effect is still the same. People are making money off of helping others get content without paying the creators.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

People are making money off of helping others get content without paying the creators.

So why don't the "creators" help people get content and keep all the money for themselves.

Seriously, do you have any idea how dumb you sound? You need to stop and think before you rant at your current level. Virtually every post you have in this forum argues with another different post and contains basic logic errors. Calm down, take a breath, think about what you are trying to communicate, and then write something that makes some kind of sense.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Creators are doing that. Perhaps you've tried sites like Amazon? Perhaps you used iTunes? Creators are earning royalties because they've got copyright on their side.

But Big Piracy wants to keep all of the money for themselves and Big Search is more than happy to point people to these sites. Why? I don't know. If they're a viable option, the fair companies can't compete.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Bob, read this carefully.

People like me are happy to pay. Happy to pay for a cyberlocker. Now, you scratch your head and think to yourself "Why don't they pay for the movies? If they're willing to spend money, why not spend it on the legal product?"

Because, what I (read as the market) wants to pay is for ACCESS. Not to specific content, but for ACCESS to that content. I don't like paying $X for one movie. I like paying $X for ACCESS to a whole swath of content. It gets more bang for my buck. I don't care where the money ends up. I'm a customer and I'm willing to pay for a far superior service.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

I see you didn't take my advice to stop and think. You just keep throwing out nonsensical crap.

Perhaps you've tried sites like Amazon? Perhaps you used iTunes?

Which one of the big content creators built these? Oh, that's right they didn't.

But Big Piracy wants to keep all of the money for themselves and Big Search is more than happy to point people to these sites.

What money? Show me any study or any information that proves "Big Piracy" is making the kind of money you seem to be implying.

They charge money for a reason.

Once again, I don't see any type of service being offered by content creators.

Look. I'm done; you are clearly either too stupid, too short-sided, or too vested in the current system. You don't seem to have any critical thinking skills. You just rant on about how copyright is some magical beast that poops money and how the beast is being strangled by pirates and you want to murder the pirates and none of it makes any fucking sense.

In conclusion: you are either a consummate troll (if so I congratulate you) or one of the most foolish people I've ever interacted with. Take your pick.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

the file lockers [...] who [charge] for access to a collection of data that is widely understood to be pirated material.

I thought file lockers charged people money to rent out server storage space to store files. While it's possible that some people can be using file lockers for piracy purposes, the same could also be said of USENET, bittorrent, email, IMs, imageboards, and even IRC. If even one person uses a legitimate service for an illegitimate reason -- such as pirating music -- would you want that service shut down as a "pirate harbor" or a "rogue site"?

People are making money off of helping others get content without paying the creators.

I run a small imageboard -- nothing worth mentioning by name, trust me -- and I've seen people post artworks that were hidden behind paywalls on my site. My imageboard is free to use, I don't have any ads on the imageboard at all, I don't ask for donations of any kind, and I don't have any content of my own to sell through the website.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

You and OOTB should start a company together. He keeps saying "WHERE IS THE NEW BUSINESS MODEL?" and you keep saying "PIRATES MAKE MILLIONS!" - sounds like kismet. You two should be millionaires in a few weeks, I suspect.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

That's why censorship does exist outside the Internet. Outside the Internet restaurants and other venues that want to host independent performers often don't because the liability is too great. They have to pay a parasite third party collection society money under the pretext that someone 'might' infringe. These bills seek to do the same to the Internet, to make hosting independent content too artificially expensive, just like they did outside the Internet.

Outside the Internet private entities have government established exclusive privileges over broadcasting airwaves and cabelco infrastructure. The result is that IP criticisms are censored from these communication channels, despite how absurd our IP laws have become over the years. The IP maximists that wrongfully control these communication channels know that their position will fall apart in the face of scrutiny and the only way they can try to persuade others to hold their position is by censoring the opposition. Yet they are more than happy to promote pro-IP propaganda. Will MM get the opportunity to speak against IP on public television? No, because bad laws prevent it and IP maximists know that their position is not defensible in the face of scrutiny.

The government has already censored free speech outside the Internet. They have granted monopoly privileges on almost everything, from taxi cab monopolies to mailbox delivery monopolies. Why should I believe they want to do anything different to the Internet? They want to turn it into the monopolized platform that they turned everything outside the Internet into.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Yeah, PIPA and SOPA aren't going to censor people or break the Internet!

They're just going to make it possible for the government to control the handling of DNS for the global Internet, get websites blacklisted without a court order or adversarial hearing, and prevent financial companies like PayPal from doing business with blacklisted sites.

...wait, how is that not going to censor people or break the Internet, again?

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Practically any law can be said to have the potential to lead to censorship. The police could pull over Mike on the way to his office, give him a bogus drunk-driving test, and then lock him up. The DUI laws can be just as effective for censorship as SOPA when they're abused. So should we get rid of the DUI laws too?

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Should we allow a new law that says that a person can be arrested for DUI if the arresting police officer swears on his boy scout honor that said person didn't pass the drunk-driving test, without actually giving one, on the promise that no police officer will ever lie about the nonexistent drunk-driving test?

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Can you explain why I should believe you, an Anonymous Coward who offers no explanation or reasoned argument, when a 100 lawyers say it is censorship and the techs who build the internet say it will be broken? What exactly are your credentials? What makes you more knowledgeable than them?

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"at the end of the day, just too darn cheap to pay $1 to buy a song."

You really think it's that simple? People are just too damn cheap to pay $1? Really?

The RIAA alone claims millions if not billions in losses. All of the industries who claim they're losing out would be trillions of dollars a year. We're not talking about a $1 song, we're talking about thousands of dollars per person these people are claiming they lose. Thousands of dollars that people don't have.

Even if SOPA and PIPA did exactly what the supporters claim and somehow didn't violate human rights, it won't give these companies the trillions they "lost".

I would completely demolish the rest of your argument, but I think what I've already said takes the base of your argument out from under you.

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"I don't think 99.9% of American knows about SOPA or Protect IP."

The current population of the US is about 311 million. .1% of that would be 311,000 people. Since over one million people emailed congress is more than three times the amount of people you think know about these acts, I believe you're in error. Yes there might be some duplication, but I did not include snail mails, phone calls, and petition signatures so my calculation is probably on the low side.

Of course from you're view point it gets worse when you realize these are only the people that spoke up.

"So quit deluding yourself. You've got only yourself to blame. If you don't provide content creators the ability to protect their work and stop low-level "sharing", you're going to get draconian bills like this."

After years of being treated like a cow to be milked for money at best and a thief at worst, I no longer care what happens to the content companies. I care about the content creators and that is a separate issue. The content industries have brought this on themselves. To quote Princess Leia: "The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers." Just substitute content for star systems.

Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

And how many of those 1 million people thought they were sending some email to stop censorship and how many actually read SOPA? Oh wait. I guess you think that stopping Pirate Bay is somehow just as bad as stopping Martin Luther King from protesting.

Helping someone get content for free is NOT protected speech. It's being an accessory to a crime.

And if you don't like the media companies, ignore them. Don't buy their cruddy merchandise. But don't steal it and use "free speech" as some rationalization.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

I don't think that small-scale, personal-use piracy is a felony crime, and I don't think we need to hand the Internet's security over to the government and the Big Media companies.

SOPA would give the government -- led by Big Media, of course -- the power to alter the DNS, silence speech, and cut sites off from financial providers without a court order or adversarial hearing.

Imagine, for a moment, if Big Media targets a blog on Blogger that contains a single "infringing" MP3 on it -- which, later, turns out to have been sent to the blog by a record label. Nothing else on the blog is infringing; it's all protected speech. Big Media uses SOPA's power to get the entire blog blocked by every ISP in the country and PayPal to cut off the blogger who runs it just to whack the one tiny mole that ends up having been their fault in the first place.

Do you see how SOPA can be an abuse of power? Do you see how copyright law can be abused to silence perfectly legitimate speech?

There are smart ways of fighting piracy. The legislative equivalent of a hydrogen bomb is not one of them.

Re: Re: Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

"And how many of those 1 million people thought they were sending some email to stop censorship and how many actually read SOPA?"

How many supporters or more importantly congressmen and senators have actually read SOPA?

"Helping someone get content for free is NOT protected speech. It's being an accessory to a crime."

Preemptively taking away someone's 1st amendment rights to make sure no content is infringed on is about as un-American as you can get.

"And if you don't like the media companies, ignore them. Don't buy their cruddy merchandise. But don't steal it and use "free speech" as some rationalization."

Three point in reverse order.

1) Where did I use free speech as a rationalization for unlicensed coping?

2) Because of their actions I BUY less than I use to and if I can completely avoid the company (Sony) I will.

3) I would love to ignore these companies. However; as long as they keep trying to act like the Catholic church in medieval Europe before the printing press and also trying to steal OUR cultural heritage, that is not an option.

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Man are you stupid or what !!!!
NO ONE IS OPENING UP THE DOOR TO 1984 ON MY WATCH !!!
These bills have more than meets the eye retard.This is a lot more than Censoring Websites.This is an outright attack on our Country's freedom and the way the World looks at us.We always stand up for freedom but you want us to take it up the butt.
This is ultimately about controlling the Internet as in China.This Censorship will only be the beginning.It is the tip of a dirty stinky Iceberg that will sink all of us into a China or Russia type Nation.That may sound a bit wacky but I have absolutely no trust or faith in a Government who allows Big Money & Politics to merge with each other.
We must fight these bills to end as our way of life is ultimately at stake here.I will fight for freedom ! I will go to jail for freedom ! This Government will never shut me up unless I am dead.

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Your views are not in line with the majority of the population, sir. Also, it has been proven, TIME AND AGAIN, that people who download are, in fact, the biggest PURCHASERS of content! So quit whining about the "free riding scum" and change your business to take advantage of the changes in technology, instead of criminalizing your customers! In short, if you want to keep SELLING CONTENT, dont be a douche!

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Bob, you son of a bitch. I have a short questionnaire for your ass.

1. Name any known person that is in favor of SOPA.
2. Now name one person that knows more about the bill than it's advertised "kill the pirates save the artist" propaganda and still supports it.
3. Now name one person that ^ does all that, and holds themselves accountable for their own success in life and doesn't use the system to manipulate profits.
4. Define theft.
5. Define supply and demand.
6. Now show me where the supply of digital media is not infinite and warrants me paying more than $1 per song?
7. Explain to me why the RIAA & MPAA don't see the benefits of dramatically lowering prices of their content, considering they have unfettered access to billions of customers.

The ENTIRE system is falling apart in a domino effect, but since we're talking about the entertainment business... Let’s put it this way. $1 per song + 100,000 customers = $100,000. How can that be bad for the artist in today’s day in age? Not to mention, most of the top 25 songs on the charts are cookie cut pieces of shit that took 5 minutes of somebody’s time to write and record. Not to mention every movie released in the last 15 years under the big labels turned out to be more regurgitated skeever puke. There is a profoundly short list of exceptions to this. It all leads to one thing... dramatic reduction in size of the labels, or bankruptcy.

Those are just a couple of minor examples of why I don't pity the fool. I'm sick to my stomach every time I read about the government trying to push the legislative falace down our throats, and at the same time having the audacity to act like their dirty laundry won't ever get out. I mean what the FUCK. Look at how the FDA and Big Pharma work together. What is it, $500billion in kickbacks to the FDA from Big Pharma profits made through drug patent monopolies enforced by the FDA? Yet we have a drug shortage on our hands and prices are fucking astronomical… FDA’s double dipping on the taxpayers, fucking fantastic.

Let’s summarize;A humans ability to run on all fours is synonymous with the government's ability to regulate the internet, fucked up and disturbing. Why the fuck are we paying for this?

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

Censorship is bad. Any one who thinks otherwise is a person with a dangerous mind.

Theft? What theft? There is no theft in copying. It has yet to ever be proven that it is a lost sale.

Perhaps if the industry embraced new business models rather than fight against technological change, it might make even more money instead of wasting it. Just think back to the cassette & VCR tape controversy which saved the industry and made it even larger.

Embrace technology and change, that is what is the problem. Copyright doesn't work, has never worked, and needs to go. Any one who disagrees has a twisted sense of creative rights, since all creative work is a remix and builds off of that which came before it. Fact.

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

And quit coming up with looney, extreme rationalizations to defend people who are, at the end of the day, just too darn cheap to pay $1 to buy a song.
No, you quit coming up with looney, extreme rationalizations to defend people who are, at the end of the day, just too darn greedy to charge less than $1 to for a song - when sites like Rumvi have shown that a fair price is about 10c.

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

>And quit coming up with looney, extreme rationalizations to defend people who are, at the end of the day, just too darn cheap to pay $1 to buy a song.

We'll do that, when you quit coming up with loony, extreme rationalisations to defend people who are, at the end of the day, just too darn cheap to pay artists adequately instead of pocketing it all for the CEO.

Re: Because you have a weird definition of "the public"

@bob - you obviously haven't read the bill nor do you understand the burden this would take away from the RIAA and MPAA and place 10x on content providers - major sites like youtube and ISPs alike. The security issue is a valid one. With this bill, ISPs would have to create infastructure to scan and compile every piece of data - meaning they have to be able to see what that data is. How will your tune change when you email someone a picture of your kid labelled "My daughter playing "Red Riding Hood" and the new algorithms automatically delete your email as 'potential violation". Despite what Viacom is telling you, this bill does NOT protect them, it gives them the power to settle lawsuits when ISPs and site owners can't afford to fight them, because it will be all but impossible to comply. Worst of all, backing this bill would give your government the ability to censor news and global communications, or shut down social networks to curb protests. Currently, that is almost impossible. Think about this before you decide who you're with - it's not "pirates vs entertainment" or even "entertainment against theft". It is "government against lack of control". Remember Obama's "Internet kill switch" bill that was shut down? This replaces it with the MPAA and RIAA funding the cause.

Re: "An FBI anti-piracy warning."

"The big Hollywood studios and major record labels have spent the past decade treating their fans as if they were criminals."

If I watch a DVD, what's the first thing that usually comes up in the DVD? An FBI anti-piracy warning.

----------------

Fact is that "big Hollywood studios and major record labels" are usually correct in that view. The DVD notice is probably required as a legalism, and is justified when large numbers of people /don't/ regard "sharing" as illegal. Heck, kids (after being caught) will claim they don't know anything about copyright, just think music is "free".

Your times spent watching those notices is lost because of pirates, not the content providers.

If everyone followed the clear morality as to who /owns/ the content, then there'd be no need for the warning, right?

Re: Re: "An FBI anti-piracy warning."

Pirates are a menace they are not organized, they can't elect anyone except in some few jurisdictions in this world, they don't have a unified voice, but still they manage to do the same things independent of faith, color, sex or politics, there is nothing more universal than "piracy" at the moment in the world, is just impressive how such a bunch people can threaten "government granted rights".

Eventually "piracy" will be legalized, not because a minor fraction of the population want it too but because the vast majority of people don't care and will never respect those laws.

Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

The problem here is that even with the reframing, it's easy to see that SOPA and PIPA are attempts to circumvent the First Amendment, destroy due process, and legislate the Internet -- all with Big Media's mistake-laden charts to guide the way, of course.

There are better ways of dealing with piracy -- which, at its core, is a business model issue -- than with a carpetbombing of Free Speech rights and the security of the global Internet.

Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

There are better ways of dealing with piracy -- which, at its core, is a business model issue -- than with a carpetbombing of Free Speech rights and the security of the global Internet.

---------

YEAH, sort of with ya up to there in your new framing, BUT WHAT IS YOUR NEW "business model"? That question MUST be answered before industry even thinks of changing. Has to be so that /definitely/ recovers costs of oh, say, a $100M. I'm waiting... not too expectantly... for you to reveal this secret.

Re: Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

Who says that there has to be one new business model and that's it -- or that the business model has to make millions upon millions for it to be a truly successful model?

You're playing a zero-sum game here: either a business model has to make millions or it's worthless. It's the same trap that Big Media has fallen into, and it's prevented those companies from adapting to the changing marketplace and the advances of technology.

There is no "golden bullet" business model, and acting as if people have to come up with one -- or that there even is one any more -- just because they oppose the idiocy that Big Media represents is...well, quite frankly, it's stupid.

Re: Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

"That question MUST be answered before industry even thinks of changing."

There in lies the problem. The world is changing around you and you refuse to change with it until someone - anyone - tells you how (as if they have an obligation to tell you). But then you ignore them anyway.

FYI: Stomping your feet and throwing a tantrum whining that the world is changing in such a way that you can't figure out how to blow hundreds of millions on making a movie like you used to doesn't actually solve your problem.

Re: Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

Hey, look everyone, out_of_the_blue is back again asking for someone to tell him the magical business model that gives a 100% guarentee of getting a positive ROI on 100 million dollars after it's been explained to him 50 times that such a thing doesn't exist in free market capitalism, Internet or no Internet.

Re: Re: Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

Re: Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

well, if there was an easy and quick way to the program i want when i want for say .25c an episode (i'm hoping thats about 20p) then i would pay - and possibly 40m others might world wide - thats $10m. Is that enough to make and profit from an episode? I would hope so. But i can't yet, so i pirate

Re: Re: Re: WELL, if mis-represented as attack on First Amendment,

The answer is simple, don't produce a $100 million dollar crap.

Produce a $100K master piece, I heard that Rocky cost 35K and Stallone used 15K to buy his dog back. Alfred Hitchcock never produced a $100 million film and still is considered a master in his own right, Charles Chaplin also another example.

I hear that there are families in the US that can live comfortably on a 20K a year when most people would be below the poverty line, they do that producing their own food, maybe this is what we as a society need a hard look at how we do things right now, it cost too much and it isn't producing the desired effects it is causing hardship not wealth or health.

Maybe every house should be seen not as a shelter but as a mini-factory where everybody produces something(i.e. food, medicine, clothes and parts for other things). The real important thing is not money, is work, people need to find reasons to work, ants and bees have societies and I don't see them being paid money to do any work, can we learn something from that behavior?

On the flip side, internet companies recognize that their users are everything. They build communities, they connect and they give those community members a voice -- rather than just assuming the relationship is one way (and only exists after you give them money).

Unless you're Google or the IMDb. They both treat users like a necessary evil that they'd rather not have to deal with.

The Beverly Hills Bar Association is throwing a luncheon about SOPA on 12/14. Panelists include a Congressional member of the HJC (where SOPA is pending), an anti-piracy advocate, an anti-piracy attorney, an MPAA attorney, and a studio lawyer. If I didn't have an exam that overlaps with it, I'd be attending just to interrupt their [presumed] pep rally with this data and some of the more salient points on Mike's list.

Re:

Mailing Lists and Organization.

The German novelist Hans Helmut Kirst, writing about the July 20, 1944 conspiracy by elements of the German army to overthrow Hitler, observed that the conspiracy was really a series of little conspiracies, all trying to find each other in the limited time available, under conditions of strict secrecy. Of course, the conspirators failed to link up in time, and the result was a massacre of the closet anti-nazis. This is, I think, an instructive analogy.

Organizations such as Demand Progress are building up e-mailing lists, and these lists include postal ZIP code. ZIP codes are good enough to identify congressional districts, which means that the organization can keep track of the date of the primary election in various states, not to mention special elections, and send out an e-mail to the people who have the opportunity to vote against someone like Rep. Bob Goodlatte. Equally important are the URL's in millions of bookmark files.

Attendance at a primary election, especially in an off-year such as 2010, is generally pretty low, because most of the candidates for a given nomination agree with each other on most points, and specifically on the points with which ninety percent of voters are concerned with, that is taxes, health care, unemployment, immigration, etc. A comparatively small number of people deciding to turn up for the primary on account of a side-issue, such as copyright, can be enough to swing a primary election in favor of a challenger who agrees with the incumbent about the aforesaid basic issues, but differs about the side-issue. Once the bidding is spelled out, an organized group can effectively demand accommodation on a side-issue. The National Rifle Association, for example, has long established a "don't tread on me" rule.

This whole structure of organization against the excesses of copyright is accumulating. The mailing lists grow longer and more complete. Each time there is a new threat, the mailing lists start from a higher baseline, and increase a bit. The movie and music industries cannot really compete with us. Astroturfing doesn't work as far as the ballot box. The movie and music industries don't employ very many people-- nothing remotely comparable to the automobile industry or the public schools, for example. Most of these employees are concentrated in a few states and congressional districts. We have reached a point where the number of people who have received legal threats from the movie and music industries is approaching the number of people employed by these industries. Probably the most effective core of opposition to the movie and music industries are parents who are afraid that they might lose their houses because their twelve-year-old daughters have downloaded songs.

Furthermore, a disproportionate number of music industry "fanboys" are underage. They are fixated on the idea that their neighborhood "kid band" will suddenly make them rich-- which is about as likely as winning the state lottery. Being underage, the fanboys cannot vote. By the time they are old enough to vote, they are likely to become economic realists, concerned with passing a civil-service exam or something like that. In the real world, you don't wait to be "discovered" by a talent scout. You earn a college degree, or pass a civil service exam, or whatever, to get a better job.

By the way, I'll save "Bob" (#1, 18, 21, 25, 32, 45, 48, et. seq.) a question. I really don't listen to music much, because I can't concentrate properly on my reading or writing or programming when music is playing. My clock radio, tuned to the local public radio station, wakes me up in the morning, and that's about it. Classical music is not public-domain per se, but the underlying scores are, and so many people have produced recordings of their own performances that the recordings are not really scarce goods. They turn up at public library rummage sales all the time. You have to know really a lot about music to be able to make the fine distinctions between one symphony orchestra interpretation of a particular work, and another orchestra's interpretation. That seems to apply with even more force, now that Classical MIDI has come along. Classical MIDI operates in a de-facto "free" regime, and I simply haven't a good enough ear to be discontented with its shortcomings, real or imagined.

My one big expenditure on music in the last twenty years was, paradoxically, on anti-music. I had a noisy apartment neighbor, who insisted on playing his stereo full blast, playing the kind of punk kid's music that "Bob" thinks everyone has to listen to, and it was difficult to do anything about it in the short term. So I spent a couple of hundred dollars on a pair of noise-canceling headphones. They didn't work very well, because they were designed to cancel jet-engine noise, rather than rock-star-drum noise. This was some years ago, of course, when a couple of hundred dollars only bought a LC filter, or maybe a phase-lock-loop. The filter locked onto the dominant _continuous_ noise, the air conditioner motor and fan, and filtered that out quite nicely. There may be a market for a modernized version. One could use a micro controller, perhaps, and cancel out episodic sounds in the 50 HZ range (a wavelength of twenty feet), those which are not disrupted by internal reflection and interference when passing through a wall. If you take a noise at 500 Hz, and assume the wall to be six inches thick, a portion of the signal gets reflected back to the originating surface, and reflected back again, getting a foot out of phase, and that's half a wavelength, or complete cancellation.

Commenting as Anonymous

(I usually comment here as "Prashanth".)
I was going to write a comment about how I sent my senators and representative a whole bunch of letters, many of them signed by a bunch of my friends here in college. Then I saw the absolute inane arguments of "bob" and the great responses of Anonymous Cowards.
You know what? Non-anonymity should be banned from the Internet! I mean, what if kids with names like "bob" come here signing their real names and spouting innocent little rubbish? They need to be protected! Think of the children!
(How am I doing?)

give it up "bob"

First you claimed that I-pods will not play YouTube videos. Almost everything on YouTube can be captured with free software in MP4 format. The same software will convert the few FLV only posts to MP4 Video I-pods play MP4's

Then : "Heck, YouTube doesn't work on many devices without the right codecs" - So, are you incapable of downloading codecs? If so, why are your views on technology of any value to anyone?

Then "Neither YouTube or Spotify provide the music in open formats like MP3" - Ever heard of the freeware converters that strip the audio of almost any video format into MP3?

I don't believe you are that technically ignorant, so I must come to a differing conclusion. You deny the existence of any of these possibilities because they cannot exist in you ideal copyright maximalist world, where the content owner has the absolute right, backed up by the police power of the state, to decide what equipment I may use to listen to content, and any sort of format conversion is a criminal offense.

Finally, when you make very serious allegations of conflict of interest, asking you to prove such serious allegations is not a sign that the other side is "losing" Your reaction does indicate that you either have no such proof, or are probably employed by someone in the copyright industry, and are booking your time on this blog to someone's account. (Now, ask me to "prove it" and show that you are "losing" by doing so)

Re: give it up "bob"

>I don't believe you are that technically ignorant, so I must come to a differing conclusion. You deny the existence of any of these possibilities because they cannot exist in you ideal copyright maximalist world, where the content owner has the absolute right, backed up by the police power of the state, to decide what equipment I may use to listen to content, and any sort of format conversion is a criminal offense.

This pretty much makes sense when you consider that he believes you need permission to do all that.

1 mil emails !!! so ?

However, in this case over one million emails were sent (and unlike Creative America, users were able to edit the emails to add their own thoughts) in just one day

SO ?

Many of that million will be the same people spamming them, and most if not ALL of them will be ignored.

Do you understand that politicians take almost NO notice of emailed complaints, its just too easy to do.

A written and posted letter carries about 10 times the weight to a poly than an email does, and a written letter carries almost no weight unless it is followed up by phone and an appointment to see that person.

1 million from a population of 350,000,000 is 0.285% of the population.

Re: 1 mil emails !!! so ?

Actually, the only thing held in even lower regard are petition signatures. Often forged (particularly electronic ones) and far too easy to manipulate. Those are first in line for the delete key. Email's next.

NONE of you cover the other side of the coin. Do I "Pirate" Things I...suppose so. But hear me out - I buy blanks, disk burners, Data Cards, Computer hardware, Pay for high speed internet, Pay for Gaming Consoles, Pay for hacking devices.
My tigerdirect, dealextreme, ebay, amazon order historys are numerous+ pages long...each. Why? BECAUSE I PIRATE.
NONE of you ignorant pompous know it alls speak of the global economic benefits across numerous industries. It hurts four industries IMO... movie, music, software, gaming.
How many does it help? COUNTLESS. After multi platinum mo-town artists died on welfare after being raped by music companies. The ethical and moral horrors of all those industries knew NO BOUNDS and all for more money. KARMA came for them and now this will solve that karma for them?
There are some important life laws you can not escape and one more written US law won't stop any of those after you.
The US has the highest prison population by far and now we need MORE greedy jerk laws to fill the void? What void - There is no room left in them. Want to fix the debt and prison crisis? Start getting rid of stupid over the top criminal statutes, lying officers and draconian sentencing not MAKE MORE OF IT. We are just criminalizing our entire population slowly but surely and THAT will reap GREAT economic consequences and loses in taxes.

The solution ?

Free Speach

This bill needed no answer from us the free American people.
That was supposed to be the job we sent people to Washington for so such an outcry tells me we don't trust our leaders to do the wright thing and we are probably right.
Too many times we have been sold out NAFTA comes to mine etc etc.

Copyright

Copyright and a truly free market are mutually exclusive; if you support a free market, then think about this.

Furthermore, copyright in its current form is designed to benefit corporations, not individuals. If you believe that corporations can become tyrants, then think about just how much copyright benefits them.

All I ask you to do is question copyright in any way, particularly in its current form. Think about the cons of copyright. Think about how things in the public domain benefit people today. (hint hint many classics, Shakespeare, the English language.) Shakespeare did not need copyright. Disney benefited greatly from things that were not copyrighted.

Also, libraries equate to piracy. Most people only read a specific book once, maybe a few times. Think about how much money corporations today would make if libraries were illegal. Then think about how much society praises libraries.

My personal opinion? If 100 years from now, copyright was virtually nonexistent, then the economy would not be in worse shape. It might have an neutral effect on the world. Personally I think the world would blossom with creativity. Giving attribution would still be commonplace, because that is just common courtesy.

Masnick sells out - again - for shit....

"Adsense pays shit. The terms don't let us reveal our actual revenue, but I can say that the monthly revenue from AdSense is equal to about a day of our hosting costs."

Why then would you even subject yourself to those terms, and that agreement Masnick ?

Why would you 'sell your soul' and enter non-disclosure agreements, and other traiding restrictions if the 'rewards' for doing that are SO LOW ?

are you also aware that by stating that the amount you make would cover the cost of one days hosting of your site, would be TELLING PEOPLE HOW MUCH THEY PAY YOU, and therefore would make you in breach of your contract.

Sure you did not use an actual money value, but you dont need to use actual money values to determine the level of money.

I could look up your ISP and look at their hosting rates for one day and by that I could determine how much google pays you!

You are not allowed to state "what they pay you" ??

But you stated "they pay me shit"

So you have stated clearly here Masnick that when it comes to profit, copyright, censorship and CwF+RtB goes out the window !

This is ridiculous. How did such a bill even get through. Congressmen should remember that they are elected by us, yet they seek money and benefits from large corporations while the common people do not get any gain and lots of loss. Will be very shocked if this got passed